The $\bf{\Lambda p}$ interaction studied via femtoscopy in p + Nb reactions at $\mathbf{\sqrt{s_{NN}}=3.18} ~\mathrm{\bf{GeV}}$

TL;DR

This study uses femtoscopy to measure proton-Lambda and proton-proton correlations in p+Nb reactions at 3.18 GeV, providing insights into hyperon-nucleon interactions and source sizes in nuclear collisions.

Contribution

First femtoscopy measurement of pLambda and pp correlations in p+Nb reactions at this energy, demonstrating the technique's sensitivity to hyperon-nucleon scattering parameters.

Findings

Proton-proton source size of 2.02 fm

Proton-Lambda source size of 1.62 fm

Femtoscopy as an alternative to scattering data analysis

Abstract

We report on the first measurement of $p\Lambda$ and $pp$ correlations via the femtoscopy method in p+Nb reactions at $\mathrm{\sqrt{s_{NN}}=3.18} ~\mathrm{GeV}$, studied with the High Acceptance Di-Electron Spectrometer (HADES). By comparing the experimental correlation function to model calculations, a source size for $pp$ pairs of $r_{0,pp}=2.02 \pm 0.01(\mathrm{stat})^{+0.11}_{-0.12} (\mathrm{sys}) ~\mathrm{fm}$ and a slightly smaller value for $p\Lambda$ of $r_{0,\Lambda p}=1.62 \pm 0.02(\mathrm{stat})^{+0.19}_{-0.08}(\mathrm{sys}) ~\mathrm{fm}$ is extracted. Using the geometrical extent of the particle emitting region, determined experimentally with $pp$ correlations as reference together with a source function from a transport model, it is possible to study different sets of scattering parameters. The $p\Lambda$ correlation is proven sensitive to predicted scattering length values from chiral effective field theory. We demonstrate that the femtoscopy technique can be used as valid alternative to the analysis of scattering data to study the hyperon-nucleon interaction.